Bela Lugosi, Jr. has been among those who felt filmmakerEdward D. Wood, Jr. exploited his father's stardom, taking advantage of the fading actor when he could not refuse any work.[3] Most documents and interviews with other Wood associates in Nightmare of Ecstasy suggest that Wood and Lugosi were genuine friends and that Wood helped Lugosi through the worst days of his depression and drug addiction.[4]

^"Friedemann O’Brien Goldberg & Zarian Names Bela G. Lugosi Of Counsel". Metropolitan News-Enterprise. Retrieved 2008-04-20. But an appeals court overturned that decision and finally in 1979, the California Supreme Court, in Lugosi v. Universal Pictures, ruled that Lugosi did not inherit any rights that Universal Pictures infringed. It said the Lugosi name and likeness could not pass on to the actor’s heirs, since the right of publicity died with Lugosi. However, the California Assembly passed a “Celebrities Rights Act” in 1985 which said that rights of publicity survive the celebrity’s death and descend to heirs by wills, among other means.